SCOTTSDALE, Az. – A whole lot of eyes were upon the Duncanville High basketball team Thursday night in the Chaparral High gymnasium.
And the squad from just outside of Texas held up quite well, thank you very much.
Coach David Peavy’s Panthers, taking on a Montverde (FL) Prep team that may have assembled for “talented” players than any other program in the sport, got a sensational performance from a relatively unknown junior to knock off the Eagles in the second night of the Hoophall West.
Point guard Aric Demings, the linchpin behind Duncanville pulling to a 13-point advantage in the third quarter, took a cross-court pass from Davion Sykes and – after pump faking Jalen Hood-Schfino into Phoenix – nailed a 3-pointer from the right wing two seconds before the shot expired to give the Texans a 67-66 victory.
Six-foot-nine junior Kwame Evans had put the Eagles ahead with 7.1 seconds to go, hitting two free throws while being fouled in the low post by another highly recruited player from the Class of 2023, Ronald Holland.
Demings’ fifth 3 – and 21st, 22nd and 23rd points – handed Coach Kevin Boyle’s Montverde crew its second loss (it was beaten by another Florida-based prep school squad, IMG Academy, six nights earlier) while pushing the Panthers to 9-0.
Among Demings’ teammates are one of the best of the unsigned players in the Class of 2022 (6-6 guard Anthony Black) as well as the 6-8 Holland – a standout on the Team USA’s 16U FIBA championship squad.
And Montverde put a starting lineup on the floor with players headed to Duke (Dariq Whitehead), Indiana (Hood-Schfino), Texas (Dillon Mitchell), USC (Vincent Iwuchukwu) and Florida (Malik Reneau).
But it was the 6-2 Demings – who said afterward that his only scholarship “offers” have come from Morgan State and Rio Grande Valley – who had more impact on the outcome of the contest, at both ends of the floor, than anyone else.
His on-ball defensive pressure (especially when the 6-5 Hood-Schfino trying to bring the ball up the floor and trigger his team’s half-court offense) sparked the second-quarter rally, when the Panthers turned a 13-point deficit into a three-point advantage at intermission.
His five 3s stretched the Eagles’ half-court defense to the breaking point, and his ability to push his dribble at top speed and to get the ball, mostly, where it always needed to go helped his team negate its significant size disadvantage.
Look for him to now be on the radar for any college program in search of a quality player in his class at point guard.
Duncanville – which picked up wins over California powers Corona Centennial and Chatsworth Sierra Canyon in Texas over Thanksgiving weekend – is positioning itself to not only be the top “public high school” team in the country this season but the best even with prep school programs tossed into the mix.
Two of the immensely talented programs in that category, Chandler (AZ) Compass Prep and Mouth of Wilson (VA) Oak Hill Academy, overwhelmed opponents Thursday night.
Coach Steve Smith’s squad got double-figure scoring from six players in Oak Hill’s 90-55 punchout of Greenville (SC) Legacy.
And Compass Prep’s dynamic group of guards – notably UCLA-bound Dylan Andrews and juniors Kylan Boswell and Mookie Cook – helped it score the first 19 points in its eventual 79-41 win over Wasatch Academy of Utah.
In the other game played Thursday, between area public school teams, Highland (in Gilbert) edged Centennial (Peoria), 54-50, behind Mason Knollmiller’s 25 points.
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